The Pasadena Police Division seized greater than 300,000 fentanyl tablets in September, and amongst them so-called “rainbow fentanyl.”
It’s the first time they’ve discovered massive portions of multi-colored tablets that appear like sweet, in line with investigators with the Pasadena Police Main Narcotics and Particular Investigation Unit.
Fentanyl is an artificial opioid that’s 50 occasions stronger and lethal than heroin, in line with the Facilities for Illness Management.
Pasadena police say dozens of packages, containing round 10,000 tablets every, have been discovered hidden contained in the tire of a truck. Police say drug sellers in Mexico and China are creating colourful tablets with a view to keep away from detection by regulation enforcement.
It’s a pattern being seen nationwide.
In New York Metropolis, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration New York Division introduced the invention of rainbow fentanyl packaged inside a Legos toy field.
Two males face federal fees in Maryland for fentanyl drug trafficking after police discovered 1000’s of tablets packaged in Nerd sweet containers and Skittles sweet luggage, in line with federal prosecutors.
The quantity of fentanyl tablets being seized by regulation enforcement is skyrocketing.
Pasadena police Lieutenant Marcia Taglioretti says from 2021 “it began out perhaps about 100,000 tablets of fentanyl that have been seized however 2022 that elevated about 600,000, it was roughly 700,000 tablets” seized by their division.
The NBC4 I-Workforce reviewed information from the Los Angeles Coroner’s officer and located fentanyl-related deaths elevated greater than 1,700 % from 2016 by way of 2021.
With Halloween simply across the nook, police say the hazard is {that a} child may decide up one in every of these coloured tablets pondering its sweet and with out understanding what’s inside may develop into sick and even die.
Whereas the possibilities of rainbow fentanyl exhibiting up in your children sweet bag are extraordinarily low, Lieutenant Taglioretti says to verify sweet is in sealed packages and if something appears suspicious it’s higher to be secure than sorry, throw out the sweet or name the police if you’re involved.
See extra data from the FDA right here and DEA right here.
